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Sunday, December 5, 2010

I received an e-mail from a lady who asked me what she can she do to keep her horse from peeing in the same spot in his stall day after day. SHe doesn't like the smell and it turns the soil black.

Many horses kept in pens or stalls will pee in the same spot time and time again, saturating that ground with urine and creating that ammonia smell.

Most horses don't like the spray of the pee hitting them in the legs, so you can lay a mat down in that area. When they pee the spray will spatter on their legs and they will most like go someplace else to pee. You can keep moving the mat around the stall as they begin to "wear out" one spot or another. A light weight truck bed mat would work.

Another thing you can do it to place pylons (traffic cones) in that pee spot to serve the same purposes. Sometimes this just doesn't work. In fact, the picture is two large traffic cones I placed in my Mustang's pen just to illustrate, as I had previously tried this and would find the cones tossed around or even find them outside of the pen. He would pick on up in his teeth and fling it about. Great fun for him I reckon.

You can dig up the wet dirt from the pee spot and spread around to let it air/Sun dry, as well as rake in a little bit of lime to the soil to counteract the ammonia smell. I always keep a couple hundred pounds of lime on hand for this purpose and in case I have to bury an animal.